Starting Cultivation in Wasteland

The soul body can easily switch places, and Qu Jianlei might not be able to catch up—even though the other party’s escape speed is too fast.

But this pecking and drinking is largely destined by the heavens.

Having once coveted the convenience of collecting souls by the research institute, now falling into this situation is also the Heavenly Dao’s retribution.

Qu Jianlei informed his companions about the discovery, and they unanimously decided: continue the pursuit!

The paranoid even suggested, "Boss, if your body hasn’t recovered, just stay here and guard the teleportation device."

Granny Jia nodded too, "Don’t worry, this time we won’t leave any survivors, just kill them directly!"

Those who understood already knew, the previous battle indeed had a bit of greed.

Otherwise, could a mere wave of supreme level spiritual power withstand four strong supreme level attacks in succession?

However, how could Qu Jianlei possibly let them go on an adventure without him?

Even setting aside security concerns, he was very curious about what this ghost cultivator’s plan was.

As for guarding the array plate, of course it was left to Flower Scorpion.

With her vigilance and strength, as long as she doesn’t encounter A-level’s siege, there basically won’t be any issues.

The six people teleported over and skillfully headed toward the research institute.

The research institute covers a vast area, just the walled area spans two to three square kilometers.

Outside the walls is also a forbidden zone, with two sides blocked by a river and simple iron fences erected along the riverbank.

The other two sides are more complex, with trenches dug and multiple layers of barbed wire set up.

It seems to be heavily guarded, but apart from the gate posts, there are few people.

There are some surveillance devices, but Little Lake discovered last time that many of them were broken due to age.

Taking advantage of the night, everyone crossed directly over the river.

There are sensing devices in the water too, some of which still function, but with four of the six able to fly, the devices are meaningless.

After crossing the river, Qu Jianlei’s perception became increasingly clear.

However, he didn’t rush to attack, but instead let Little Lake scout the specifics first.

Little Lake is now quite efficient, clearing up all the details in just a minute.

The soul body’s current location is in an "abandoned corpse pool" outside the perimeter walls.

The institute is a place for researching human potential, conducting too many unconventional experiments, and the corpses must be duly processed.

Most of the time, there aren’t many bodies used for experiments, but it can’t be ruled out that sudden situations might require a large batch of subjects.

Moreover, some large-scale experiments involve multiple control groups, leading to a short-term need to process many corpses.

There are also two corpse pools within the walls, but those are for handling relatively sensitive bodies.

The treatment methods outside the wall are slightly rougher, but the scale is larger.

It’s nothing but deactivation with strong acid, then burning in special containers, and of course, there’s a passage for poison dumping.

To put it simply, the institute’s business has been sluggish for a long time, and the outside corpse pool has been out of use for over thirty years.

So much so that even some animal bodies are processed by the two pools within the walls because... it’s cheaper!

But when it comes to financial audits, the external large-scale pool is still mentioned, which is self-explanatory.

Because of this, even though the corpse pool has been decommissioned, the equipment and facilities remain relatively intact to prevent unexpected inspections.

The research institute within the walls still contains some sensitive materials, needing a slightly stricter guard.

Outside the walls, however, it’s quite relaxed, since it’s a forbidden zone with nothing worth guarding seriously, so guards are few.

There is a person assigned to guard the corpse pool, but he’s just an old man.

Moreover, he has a vast area to patrol, wandering about from time to time, mostly staying in the corpse pool.

The records show the old man’s name is Setan, over one hundred and ten years old, C-level, basically just waiting for death.

Few people of his age are still in the secret department, but he has worked here for most of his life and is very experienced.

Qu Jianlei briefly introduced the situation to everyone.

The paranoid contemplated for a moment, "This Setan definitely has issues, it’s still early before dawn, shall just the two of us deal with it?"

The group discussed and reckoned that having more people might be meaningless, potentially encountering inexplicable dangers—the boss was already caught.

So the others stayed outside to blockade, providing backup.

Though the institute is dilapidated, there are bright elemental lamps outside the walls, along with several large floodlights.

However, these lights couldn’t cover everything comprehensively; generally speaking, they acted mainly as deterrence.

Qu Jianlei and the paranoid swiftly traversed the shadows, quickly approaching the corpse pool.

The name corpse pool sounds a bit sinister, but in fact, it’s a remarkably orderly structure.

At least from the outside, it looks like a small factory, complete with chimneys, wastewater pools, purifiers, distillation towers, and the like.

The two did not believe that Setan was merely C-level, and the soul body also required caution.

They did not release their perception; Little Lake had already stealthily entered the research institute’s control center.

Plus, with Qu Jianlei’s positioning, just being slightly cautious as they approached was sufficient.

The corpse pool is a series of connected buildings, and the two went directly through the main entrance.

The main entrance had access control too, but for Little Lake, it was as if nothing was there.

When the door opened, there was not a sound; indeed, even a broken ship has thousands of nails, and the infrastructure was quite solid.

Behind the door was a hall, completely dark inside, pitch-black.

But for these two, it was child’s play.

To Qu Jianlei’s slight surprise, the inside was also very neatly arranged, most of the equipment covered with transparent dust covers.

There was some dust on the covers; it wasn’t often cleaned, but at a glance, no one would guess the real purpose here.

The two continued forward silently, and soon they approached a corner of the corpse pool.

It was a guard room but had no door to the outside, only opened inward.

This design considered unexpected situations; if any bodies underwent strange transformations, the corpse pool could be locked down.

The guard had an emergency exit but it was usually closed and required high clearance to open.

Little Lake locked the exit, while Qu Jianlei and his companion wanted to figure out what was happening, so they came through the proper way.

As they approached the guard room, the two exchanged spiritual communication — indeed, there were two spiritual waves inside!

Though one of them seemed quite inferior, resembling the level of a C-level.

Faced with this situation, Qu Jianlei had to repeat his caution: be careful with using spiritual power, to avoid falling into a trap.

The two planned to continue approaching when Qu Jianlei’s movements suddenly halted, "|||"

The Paranoid understood this was a sign of the defense array, then made a gesture to take action, "?".

Qu Jianlei felt a bit reluctant but forced himself to suppress it, "Little Lake, notify the outside for a three-second countdown."

On the third second of signaling, the Paranoid unleashed a moderate Golden Wheel Slash, forcefully breaking through the defense array and the door.

Immediately, Qu Jianlei raised his hand with a finger technique, "Emotion Purification!"

He knew some light attribute techniques, but "Cage of Light" was beyond him; his proficiency in light attribute techniques wasn’t deep.

Strictly speaking, he considered the practical uses of light attribute techniques low, like the Cage of Light - not worth the time investment.

A large cluster of small white light points suddenly appeared in the space.

Just from the density and quantity of light elements, it far surpassed the purification conjured by Celestial Sound.

The guard room had its lights off, completely dark, and the large cluster of small light points instantly illuminated the space.

An elderly man with hair and beard all white turned his head around in surprise, looking at the broken door and the two people.

Qu Jianlei quickly took in the situation inside the room.

The room wasn’t big, roughly thirty square meters; one side had metal cabinets, similar to hospital morgue cold cabinets.

At this moment one of the cabinets was pulled out, on which lay the bare corpse of a young man.

Qu Jianlei could sense that his lost spiritual power was within the young man’s body.

However, he felt that the soul body’s compatibility with this corpse was even less than Adol’s.

The old man’s response was swift, pausing only for a fraction upon seeing them.

Immediately, an eerie, cold aura surged forward, grand and overwhelming.

If faced by a typical A-level, they’d be stunned for at least a moment.

The old man grinned wickedly and spoke, "Such audacity, daring to chase here!"

Qu Jianlei completely ignored him, straightaway summoning a thunder dragon, thick as a thigh, directly striking the young man’s corpse.

"Boy, I’ll make you run again!"

His primary objective was to completely destroy the soul body; otherwise, the consequences of the spiritual power falling into the opponent’s hands were unpredictable.

"Ah," a faint scream was heard, and the corpse suddenly leapt up, resembling a false resurrection.

Following this, the Paranoid also summoned a thunder dragon, striking directly at the old man, letting out a grim laugh.

"These trifling tricks, leftovers I played with long ago!"

The white-haired old man snorted coldly, "Big Black, Little Black, attack!"

Suddenly, two vague black mists emerged in the air — of course, these black mists only manifested due to the purification light group.

The black mists vaguely resembled two large dogs, each as tall as a person, ferociously charging towards the thunder dragon.

"Indeed a ghost cultivator!" Qu Jianlei sneered; this one was definitely a real ghost cultivator, though the cultivation level... strong supreme, perhaps?

Thunder dragon struck the dog silhouettes, like ice melting in hot soup, faint cries came from the two large dogs.

Yet whatever they were, seemingly possessed no intelligence or else, as they stubbornly refused to retreat.

Qu Jianlei sensed a lingering remnant of the soul body within the young man’s corpse.

The corpse was still traversed by electric currents, so he unleashed another Thunder Strike Skill — this technique was more effective at scattering spiritual power.

Seeing their side struck to pieces in an instant, and the large dogs about to disperse, the white-haired man’s eyes brimmed with rage.

"I’ll fight you to the end... huh, the passage closed?"

In the next instant, his body exploded suddenly, opting for self-combustion upon noticing the unfavorable situation.

Indeed, not a C-level, as an Awakened wanting self-combustion requires at least B-level cultivation.

"Where do you think you’re going!" Qu Jianlei uttered coldly, directly locking onto another soul body, once more launching a spiritual attack.

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